Agenda

The exhibition concentrates on two essential characteristics of the work by Sigmar Polke (1941 – 2010). His works live off organised coincidence and harbour mysterious surprises. They are marked by a playful way with words and images that transcends any attempts at categorical stringency. It focusses on the random of his paintings, which are created by the use of unusual materials. Alchemy is juxtaposed with the aspect of arabesque – ornamental line patterns, which Polke took, for example, from the wood-cuts of Dürer and Altdorfer.

Piet Mondrian (Mondriaan in Dutch) and Bart van der Leck met during the First World War in the Dutch village of Laren. The artists shared a strong conviction that the world needed a new kind of art. Mondrian liked Van der Leck’s ideas about the use of the colours red, yellow and blue . Van der Leck was impressed by Mondrian’s search for abstraction. The exhibition examines the exact nature and lasting influence of the relationship between Mondrian and Van der Leck. Referring to paintings, photographs, letters and other archival materials. The museum has the world’s largest Mondrian collection and one of the largest De Stijl-collections, an art movement in which Mondrian played an active role for several years.
 

To commemorate the Dada anniversary year in 2016, and being inspired by the legendary “Cabaret Voltaire” in Zurich (founded in 1916), two consecutive and related exhibitions are dealing with the theme of the stage in the visual arts from the 16th century up to the present day. The changing relationship between painting and stage are being shown in their respective historical contexts in an exhibition project that is at once comprehensive and crosses the genres. From their very beginnings, there has always been a particularly active exchange between the visual arts and theater. The central perspective of the early canvas paintings forms the main point of departure for Baroque theater. In addition, many painters and architects worked as festivity and stage decorators for the theater. They were familiar with the literary material and integrated this into their pictures. And vice versa, since the Renaissance, comic and tragic narrative types and characters of the theater were taken over by the visual arts. These two strands will be traced from the middle ages up to contemporary art in two acts staged in the museum, using stage models, costumes, installations, video works, paintings, sculpture and others works of art.
 

The exhibition presents the landscape painting by the impressionists at the end of the nineteenth century. They began to use color freely and they wove together light and air to create shimmering visual effects. In river landscapes they explored reflective surfaces. Their landscape motifs were no longer charged with historical or symbolic significance. Rather, impressionist artists focused on capturing the present.